The Oaktree Foundation is a leading Australian charity focussed on education in developing countries. Currently, the Oaktree Foundation, as part of its fund-raising campaign, is selling tickets to a number of its events using Flogd.
We developed a custom application to facilitate ticket sales and examples of which can be found here and here.
We are encouraging more charities to be involved with Flogd. If your charity could benefit from custom donation or ticketing facilities on any website, which process transactions instantly without redirections, then please contact me.
The Flogd Shop Builder is a drag and drop application for designing and laying out your Flogd Shops. It uses placeholders for each of your elements. We define a placeholder to be the:
location (x-y coordinates in pixels),
color (in hex),
and size (width-height in pixels or for text, the scaling factor)
of the corresponding element in each product. The Product Scroll bar holds the products for internal navigation and represents each product by displaying Image 1. There are nine placeholders in total.
Text based placeholders:
Item name
Price
Description
Image based placeholders:
Image 1
Image 2
Image 3
Image 4
Navigation based placeholder
Product Scroll - Image 1 from each of your products will appear in the Product Scroll, which allows customers to browse between products within your shop.
3. Read and click Accept if you agree to Facebook's and Flogd's terms.
4. Enter your Flogd email and password (these are securely transmitted to Flogd for verification).
5. Select the name of your shop you want to appear in your Facebook profile.
Place your Flogd shop in your Facebook. or Use the same Flogd shop in multiple places (MySpace, Facebook, Friendster, your blog) or Have different shops for each location - match designs, sizes, culture or Have different shops with different products in them at each location - match products with culture, markets, demographics or Sell stuff in any combination you like, anywhere you can think of, using Flogd.
Recent comments from users at Mashable and other blogs have been concerned about both the perception and actuality of flogd security.
Perception is totally out of my hands, though we introduced a nice graphic secure connection handler today, which aims to end this debate :)
In terms of the transmission of sensitive data, I'd like to explain in basic terms how it works. I leave technical details out deliberately for accessibility and protection.
When a website is loading that has a Flash application in it, your browser requests the swf file and once it has downloaded it, displays it as specified by the markup language. It is executed off your machine, locally, and operates in what's called a sandbox. This basically means that there are certain things the flash can and can't do to your computer and vice versa. In many cases, it can protect your data from local attacks.
When you "Check out" through a Flogd window, the local SWF file establishes a secure connection (HTTPS - SSLv3 - 128-bit encryption) with the Flogd processing server. Once a secure connection is established, sensitive data is protected in the same way as when you deal with your bank online, make purchases off Amazon or any other "normal" e-commerce transaction.
In summary, you are as vulnerable or as safe when using Flogd as using a normal e-commerce site.
I'd like to release some basic outcomes of the recent security White Paper - produced 06/15/2007
1. Sensitive information collected in an official, unchanged Flogd shop window is as secure as a standard e-commerce proposition.
2. Information is sent using over an industry standard SSL connection from the locally executed Flogd flash application to the Flogd processing center.
3. Flogd windows are less vulnerable to cross site scripting and browser/local based attacks.
We're very excited to be launching our beta version of Flogd.
Before we start, here's an example of a shop that was made using Flogd:
I’d like to explain exactly what Flogd is, who it’s good for and why it’s a bit different to what’s on offer for those looking to engage in commerce online.
Flogd is basically a flash-based tool that allows you to create shops stocked with your own products and put them anywhere using the tried-and-true method of cut and paste. It’s sort of like Photobucket, Slide or RockYou, but for products you want to sell, rather than photos of random stuff.
The shops include built-in shopping carts, and a buyer can safely and securely purchase anything from a seller's shop right then and there, rather than being redirected to another page- significantly reducing the rate of drop off, and potentially leading to increased sales and exposure.
Flogd is good for everyone looking to sell something online. If you have a MySpace profile, you can put your shop right onto your page. If you have a webpage, Flogd is easier to use than existing shopping cart software, and it’s also easier to set up when compared with merchant solutions provided by banks. It’s easier than integrating PayPal into your page. So it’s the easiest way of quickly setting up a shop online. You can even put a Flogd shop right into your latest blog entry, or into a forum comment.
So a major part of Flogd is the ability it gives you to create decentralized sales networks, rather than being tied to an eBay store and having to link back to it you can put shops where people are more likely to see them, making it easier for your customers to find you.
Of course, there are already widgets available that allow you to sell products that are listed on Amazon, or other affiliatish services. Flogd is for people selling their own products- it could be something you’ve made, or something second hand - you can sell anything.
The merchant does not need to have a PayPal account to set up with Flogd, however upon a sale money is deposited towards an email address- PayPal stores this in association with the email address, and when the customer signs up to PayPal their balance is waiting for them.
And finally, it’s free. You can upload your products, set up your shops, and sell products without paying Flogd any money at all. So you don’t really have a reason not to, do you?
